QuoteReplyTopic: The longevity of prog (and rock) music Posted: March 18 2014 at 10:37

What will happen with the prog rock we hear today in, say, 100 years? Will it still be here? Will it still be known? I ask because as of right now it's difficult to ascertain the longevity of any artist or genre in rock music in general. The oldest truly popular rock artist today might be Elvis and he's still not really that old or that popular anymore. Yes, our bands like Yes, Genesis, KC, etc, are still revered and popular among prog fans but at least a good percentage of the people listening to them are people who were fans from the start, in those bands' heyday.

I'm talking right now about levels of longevity like the ones that some classical composers (check my avatar). Even if few people will still listen to music composed by them, even in 100 years they will probably still be studied and their music still used, if only in academic settings (I certainly hope not).

But what about rock and prog artists? I think The Beatles might be the ones legitimately aiming for immortality, true immortality (like in "everybody who watched us perform live is dead and their children too" immortality). Opinions?

My take is that the way that music is not only recorded, but, crucially, retained now in digital format, makes it far more likely that digital age music will last a lot longer than much of the analogue age.

Having said that, there is a truism. Classic culture, be it poetry, prose, music, art, whatever, always stands the test of time, and will always be enjoyed.

Therefore, I truly believe that in some 200 years time The Beatles, Floyd, and other massively influential artists will still be listened to and discussed and played.

Good question. One of those "time will tell" situations. Some of the original Rock & Rollers from the 1950s have already been forgotten. What used to be the local "Oldies" station now won't play anything earlier than about 1965 simply because of the aging demographic and the need to appeal to slightly younger listeners. They are far more likely to play Hall & Oates rather than Little Richard. The big band jazz singers my grandparents used to listen too haven't been on the radio in decades. It's always out with the old and in with the new. Forget what came before you, it's today that matters. If not for this wonderful website I would not have half the Prog bands in my collection that I do now. There are so many good bands I had not even heard of until discovering PA. If not for us loyal followers of a music that many shun it would most likely disappear. A sobering thought indeed. I love classical music too, but the city I live in (Kansas City) doesn't even have a classical music radio station! There are few people I know who actually enjoying listening to it. I'm sure the music will always be there to be studied as you indicated though.

I'd base my
answer to that question not only on the quality but on the quantity of prog music
having being released over the last 40 or so years alone.

It would be very hard to suppress or forget music that has been produced in
such vast amounts, even in 500 or more years' time.

The debates about quality could very well still persist even then, but even,
say, if it was by then universally rated as rubbish (I'm sure it won't be
though), its existence would still have to be acknowledged.

So, yes, I believe it will still be talked about. Personally, I could imagine
that classical music could have been, by then, relegated to a very far back
seat, believing that prog music by then would possibly be rated as superior,
quality wise.

Just as an aside on that point: I personally quite dislike classical music (at least
the 'mainstream' classical) because firstly, it lacks any groove (personal
opinion), but secondly (and much more importantly) it lacks any musical
surprises. In 99% the harmonies used are in no way surprising or outrageous in
any way. To put an even stronger point on it: I find classical music to be just
as boring and uninteresting as radio driven pop music for exactly the same
reasons: chord progressions and harmonies are absolutely predictable and kept
within very narrow margins. This does not apply to 'modern classical', but I doubt that this will have any mass appeal, even in the future.

Prog is the only music that transcends predictability and avoids well-trodden
paths while remaining very listenable.

So, yes, I believe prog will be a larger issue in the future than any other
music style.

Apart from that I'm fairly certain that the future will contain its fair share of Brintneys, Gagas and Justins for the masses.

As long as there is recorded media there will always be niche interest in whatever has been recorded.

We have lost so much music from the past 400 years because it was never recorded. Music from the past only stood the test of time because a succession of later musicians perpetuated its popularity or rediscovered and reintroduced it, in the days before recorded media and mass publication of musical score in the form of sheet-music, manuscripts were hand-written and few in number. If a compose fell out of fashion, or wasn't widely known, the chances of any of their work surviving is slim.

With vinyl, tape, CD and digital media we have the ability to not lose anything (though I fear if we put all our faith in teh interweb then we could lose everything), and if it is there then there will be people who want to hear it. 20 to 40 years ago it would be unheard of to find the electronic music of Dr. Samuel J Hoffman (1940s) or Daphne Oram (1950s) in a record store, but now I can hear them on YouTube and buy the album from Amazon.

And if we can obtain and hear this music then there will be musicians who will be inspired by it. The longevity of a genre is a natural consequence of that genre being created and documented - genres may go in and out of fashion but they are always there somewhere, they never completely die away.

"You know what uranium is, right?Itís this thing called nuclear weapons. And other things. Like lots of things are done with uranium. Including some bad things.But nobody talks about that."

A separate question is whether the human race will survive another 200 years. If we don't, maybe the hardier species remaining on the planet can still enjoy all those Yes and Genesis albums. Ah. But what will they play them on? Who will pay for the electricity? This poses a problem. I hope it doesn't come to that.

Assuming we do, in all seriousness, I'd say maybe 1% of all the great music today will still be remembered 200 years from now. Luckily, thanks to Bandcamp, that still comes out to a couple of million bands.

My other avatar is a Porsche

It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle if it is lightly greased.

With vinyl, tape, CD and digital media we have the ability to not lose anything (though I fear if we put all our faith in teh interweb then we could lose everything)

Strangely enough, I was talking about this t'other day, and I raised this.

Like most of a certain age, I started off on vinyl and cassette, and then embraced the cd era.

When the download era started off on teh interweb, I embraced this as well, until seeing you making the (very cogent) argument on this site about the temporary nature of such things. Since then, I have gone back to buying cd only, in other words having a physical copy. I have also converted all of my (legal ) downloads onto CD-r as well, just in case.

The example of MySpace is a very good one here. Shed loads of money and content, all gone. I am sure there are others .i cannot put my mind to, as well.

It helps if the instrumentation and talent for playing it survives. The violin has pretty much stayed the same since Stradivari made his. However, it remains to be seen if "wire on wood" (Fripp's term for playing electric guitar) will survive in another fifty or 100 years. Already, we see that electric guitars & basses are being shunned by the youngest generations in favor of computer games & other diversions.

The phrase "rock is dead" has been bandied about for many years, so I'm far to proclaim it over. However, all popular musical forms seem to wane. How many of us go out to hear barbershop-quartet music, for example? Once hugely popular, this is now very much a niche (I've sung a bit of it, so I know!).

By the time any of us would have to worry about it, we'll be dust. I'm very happy to have lived through the original wave of prog music and now its renaissance. Something tells me that very good music will survive in some form, if not intact as we hear it.

Much of the music we love is now forty years old, or older. I sometimes wonder what the lads in the dormitory at college would have done if I regularly played forty-year-old music in 1973? I think I would have been pitched out of an open window. The fact that we listen to this stuff DAILY (I just enjoyed "Going For The One," a fantastic work!) speaks for itself. Also, I'm heartened that younger generations are being turned onto the music.

The classic prog bands won't reach near the level of the great composers, partly because there just wasn't as much music before the 20th century, and partly because they aren't as good. I think their music will last more than anything other than classical, jazz and the Beatles though.

Gentle Giant created a new form of music according to Keith Emerson so I think their music will be studied by academics way into the future. The rest will be regarded as a passing fad imo. The Beatles are not prog so they don't count.

Very good idea for a thread certainly. It should be borne in mind that even in my lifetime (I'm 51) Prog was relegated to that 'unclaimed fart in the elevator' circa 1979 when no-one would be seen dead admitting to liking it (apart from those routinely ostracized and ridiculed for same i.e. Hippy Prog fans) However, as Dean points out, the vagaries of fashion do not change the quality of what is being appraised. Given that the digital realm has now preserved so much of our musical past (though storage mediums still wither) here's a word of warning about the negative side of longevity by way of an anecdote:Phillip Glass studied under Nadia Boulanger and she told him that the weakness of American composers was their having no sense of history. Glass responded to the effect that this was their strength i.e. innovation can often be curtailed by an immersion in the past

It should be borne in mind that even in my lifetime (I'm 51) Prog was relegated to that 'unclaimed fart in the elevator' circa 1979 when no-one would be seen dead admitting to liking it (apart from those routinely ostracized and ridiculed for same i.e. Hippy Prog fans)

- I vaguely recall that; luckily the anti-Disco movement soon
swept in with a vengence and saved Prog from total social oblivion (and
I guess that pesky Wall album sold a few copies, I think there was a
movie, too).

Phillip Glass studied under Nadia Boulanger and she told him that the weakness of American composers was their having no sense of history. Glass responded to the effect that this was their strength i.e. innovation can often be curtailed by an immersion in the past

- I would tend to agree with Glass there, though I can't imagine old Phil or any
other composer of his class not knowing his historic
composers (that is assuming Boulanger was referring to
music history and not World history).

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